Grace and Light

Give Now!

The fundamental cornerstone of our salvation is that we are saved by grace.

For by grace, you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, (Eph 2:8 NKJV).

Grace is such an important aspect of our salvation that it can often be manipulated by people who are afraid of the freedom that God promises us through His covenant of grace. 

God knowing that our essential nature is to try to succeed in life without Him gives us the only infallible method to be transformed into the original image He has for us by the miraculous power of grace. Grace is the antithesis of self-effort or what the Bible calls works.

Turning to Ephesians 2, the one new man chapter, we see this all laid out.

And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others. (Eph 2:1-3 NKJV)

We were dead in our trespasses and sins. Why is this? Because we were married to the world. Paul tells us that the world is ruled by the prince of the power of the air who works in his kids, the sons of disobedience. These children are marked by desires of the flesh and of the mind which drive all kinds of mischief that results in broken lives, what Paul calls wrath. Now notice that the wrath he is referring to is a result of parenting. This is why there is no way to God but to be born again. It is an issue of needing a new start from birth. 

But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), (Eph 2:4-5 NKJV)

God loved us beyond our parenting. He looked upon us, who were destined for destruction, and had mercy on us. Pause for a moment and consider that. Despite our penchant for rebellion and our destination called death, God made us alive, born anew together with Messiah. How is this possible? Through His grace. 

and raised us up together and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace, you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. (Eph 2:6-10 NKJV)

There must be a transformation from the place of sin and death into the place of eternal life. This transformation happens when we receive the gift of eternal life given to us by God freely without any condition other than the receiving of it. Paul tells us that when we receive this great salvation, by grace that we are seated in shamayim, the heavens. The word for seating is shev, which is the same root as Shabbat, and sheva, which means seven or completeness. We are now complete. Our completeness is pictured as sitting in the heavens. This means positionally we are already in heaven. I know this may seem weird to those of us who look at the world around us, but the truth is we are already seated in heaven. Our place at the table is already occupied by us. 

We don’t die and go to heaven. We merely wake up into the place we already dwell in. We don’t die at all. We just give up an earthly worn-out vessel and put on another garment of light. 

For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: "Death has been swallowed up in victory." "Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?" The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. (1Co 15:53-57 NIV)

There truly is no death for the believer. We are not sinners whose outcome is death, its sting. No, we are victorious over sin and death through the grace of God, our new birth our new covenant in Messiah!

So, we are seated already in the heavens. Just because we don’t fully see that reality doesn’t make it any less the case. We are wholly saved, and our seating is in heaven, shamayim. Allow that to permeate your thinking. You are not waiting to die and go heaven! You are already in heaven just not fully aware of where you are. This is the power of grace.

This same grace is the source of the destiny you have in God in this lifetime that you co-inhabit the earth. This is called the workmanship, created in Messiah Yeshua that we are called to walk out.

You see we were before we received Him, we walk straight into death. Death is the outcome of the laws of cause and effect, actions and consequences. Why is that? Because our own efforts apart from God are grounded in the fear of death or what we call survival. Darwin called this evolution, survival of the fittest. God calls this foolishness.

“The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, But a wise man is he who listens to counsel.” (Pro 12:15, NAS95)

When we act in our own wisdom which is nothing more than our accumulated understanding of how to attempt to survive and overcome our fear of death, we act as fools. True wisdom comes from His voice to our heart which is beyond our understanding. This is the realm of His grace, His peace, shalom.

“Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (Php 4:6-7, NAS95)

The word for guarding our hearts and mind is the picture of grace. Grace is the fence that protects the seed, which is the word of God which is written in our hearts in the new covenant. 

“For finding fault with them, He says, "BEHOLD, DAYS ARE COMING, SAYS THE LORD, WHEN I WILL EFFECT A NEW COVENANT WITH THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL AND WITH THE HOUSE OF JUDAH; NOT LIKE THE COVENANT WHICH I MADE WITH THEIR FATHERS ON THE DAY WHEN I TOOK THEM BY THE HAND TO LEAD THEM OUT OF THE LAND OF EGYPT; FOR THEY DID NOT CONTINUE IN MY COVENANT, AND I DID NOT CARE FOR THEM, SAYS THE LORD. "FOR THIS IS THE COVENANT THAT I WILL MAKE WITH THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL AFTER THOSE DAYS, SAYS THE LORD: I WILL PUT MY LAWS INTO THEIR MINDS, AND I WILL WRITE THEM ON THEIR HEARTS. AND I WILL BE THEIR GOD, AND THEY SHALL BE MY PEOPLE. "AND THEY SHALL NOT TEACH EVERYONE HIS FELLOW CITIZEN, AND EVERYONE HIS BROTHER, SAYING, 'KNOW THE LORD,' FOR ALL WILL KNOW ME, FROM THE LEAST TO THE GREATEST OF THEM. "FOR I WILL BE MERCIFUL TO THEIR INIQUITIES, AND I WILL REMEMBER THEIR SINS NO MORE."” (Heb 8:8-12, NAS95)

This promise made by God, first to Israel and Judah and then extended to the nations is a penetration of the heart with the seed of His ways, what He calls His laws, or Torah. This is a heart transformation from a dead heart of stone run by the foolishness of our minds darkened by the ways of survival called the world. 

When we receive the gift of salvation, we begin to see with new eyes and hear with new ears and feel with a new heart. This heart is another term for what is inside of us that surpasses our understanding. As the Apostle Paul says it comes in conflict with what we intend to do.

“For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate.” (Rom 7:15, NAS95)

The solution to this dilemma is death. We can either die naturally and end the conflict or we can die with Messiah in faith and end the conflict now. One choice is a life of self-effort, stress and ultimate suffering. Death is painful. It stings like a hornet. Or we can surrender our conscious life to Him and he makes His abode in our hearts, what is beneath our understanding or contains our understanding. This choice is what grace, chen makes available to us.

The choice of eternal life in messiah opens up the seed in us which He guards. He is protective over that seed in us and will do anything necessary to bring it to life.

“Then the LORD said to me, "You have seen well, for I am watching over My word to perform it."” (Jer 1:12, NAS95)

His watchful eye is His love, His grace. 

Tell story of hummingbird nest.

This is a picture of the faithfulness of the Lord to watch over the seed that is in you and I. This is grace, chen.

Grace is relational in the most intimate way. God, who numbers every hair on your head, knows the intentions of every thought that we have, that God is watching over His word in and through you to perform it. BUT this isn’t a one way street. He is also allowing you and I to have a say in what happens. This is the beauty of our salvation. We are freed to live our destiny but it is our destiny. 

Lisa was just awarded the Gold Album of the year from the International Singer Songwriter Association. On the one hand we can truthfully say that it was God’s will that she receive this recognition for her album, “Where Did It Go?”. Yet she had to do the work, write the songs, sing them, record them and then risk rejection by submitting the album. It is nerve racking and I know for Lisa it was never a sure thing. She put her hope out there and we all believed for her. In this way this was God’s grace. The seed was the album and her recognition. 

The seed was also the light within her. It was her message that she got to shine. God’s seed is always His light, His truth, His creative expression in and through our lives. It both reveals Him and makes us into the image and likeness of who He is in and through us. This is the power of grace.

Activation: Ask the Lord what light he wants to reveal through your life. Focus yourself on that light.